Lilly Ledbetter biopic seeks leading lady

Lilly Ledbetter is meeting later this month with filmmaker Rachel Feldman, who just bought the rights to the activist’s autobiography to turn into a biopic.

Ledbetter — the woman President Barack Obama’s 2009 fair-pay law is named after — inked the deal with Feldman at the end of last month, Feldman told POLITICO. Ledbetter worked as a manager at a Goodyear tire plant in Alabama in the 1980s and ’90s, when the highest-paid male manager earned more than $18,000 annually more than her.

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Feldman said it’s a part made for an A-list actress, in the same vein as “Erin Brockovich,” a biopic about a real life attorney of the same name that Julia Roberts nabbed an Oscar for Best Actress in the role.

“I think Reese Witherspoon would be amazing. Jodie Foster could be great. She’s got to be Southern,” Feldman said. “It’s an opportunity for an amazing starring role and one of the things we may do right of the bat is to go to some actresses.”

She continued: “Actors who are no longer in their 20s and 30s are always crying out how there’s a dearth of amazing parts for women who are not young, who are no longer girls. This is really a golden opportunity and … we’re hoping to get as many women involved – women on every level.”

Feldman said that she’s been talking with Ledbetter, 74, by phone interviewing her for the biopic and that they’re teaching how to Skype.

“She’s very tech savvy,” Feldman said.

Feldman said she first heard of Ledbetter’s story in 2009, after Obama was first elected. She immediately contacted Ledbetter and her attorney, who told her that they wanted to wait until Ledbetter’s autobiography was released.